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As an example I (and a few friends) bought Ballistics for the Windows platform back than when it was rereleased as an budget title for as low as 10 bucks. We played it alot over the network and it sure was really fun to play. So I of course was really pleased to hear that LGP is going to port it to the linux platform.
Unfortunately it came out extremely overpriced and secondly it wasn't even compatible in networkmode with the old windows version.

Maybe Sacred is the first title I'm going to buy, but that's only because I didn't own the Windows version and I really want to play it on my linux box. The price is still very high though.

Just for the record, installed and played a little Sacred Plus with Wine. The videos don't work, but the game, as far as I was able to tell, worked just fine in 1024x768 resolution. As I've said, the original Sacred can be found for 1$. So I'm quite puzzled why start porting such games in the first place? This game doesn't deserve 40$ any way you put it (there are games far better out there, that play just nice under Wine: Fallout, Arcanum or Planescape: Tournament, just to name a few). Unless the 39$ are for playing the videos.

Is this really going to fly? I mean, with Wine 1.0 out, what's the point of having this game ported and sold for a premium price? Is anybody going to buy it for 40$ just to have it running natively instead of buying it for 1$ (Sacred) or 12$ (Sacred:Gold) and run it under Wine? I haven't yet tested Sacred under Wine, but I've just finished Disciples 2 and it worked fine. Arcanum also works fine. Beyond Divinity and Lionheart have drawing issues, but in time they will too, hopefully. I bet people will first try these vintage games under Wine and if they work, they will spend the cash on something else.

*Sigh*

We've gone through this already. If you want to know the point of having the game ported, you have to search the forums more thoroughly.

Anyway, copy protection on Linux, heh. Whatever. We'll see where that takes LGP... maybe some companies will even start opening their vault of games a bit knowing there's some form of "protection".

Ok. Found the other threads. I still see no valid point in porting this mediocre game - it's not bad, but it's not extraordinary. At least for me.

Congrats to LGP for getting a contract to port this. That was brilliant, considering how few copies they will sell at 40$. I suspect the business division of LGP is one of the best

As a reminder, the original game can be found on Amazon market for 1.09$, used and 2.99$, new

And congrats on seeing to it that you won't see any major titles on Linux for some time to come.

Each time you buy a Windows SKU, even in the bargain bin like you're proposing, is a vote for making more Windows software. Do you run Windows or Linux? If the answer is Linux, why, pray tell, would you buy software not designed for your OS? Because you can run it under WINE? Heh... You're not their customer and the moment they decide to do something that fixes a problem on their customer's machines and breaks it running under WINE, you're going to be SOL- because they make Windows software instead of WINE software.

Publishers and studios go off of sales figures, not "installed base"- as long as they think there's no money to be had (and you just proved this just now with your post...) with a Linux version and they can make money by making half-assed Windows versions, they're going to do it.

Keep bitching about price, nobody wants to buy, etc. folks- you all that're doing the bitching are the reason we're in the mess we're in.

Porting old games to Linux and then charging a ton for them is useless and is not helping anybody in any way.

... and I suppose you think porting a game is cheap? I think Svartalf know this and can explain it way better than me, but there's quite a lot of expenses that need to be covered. Comparing the price of the Linux-version to the current price of the Windows-version is quite unfair. In Linux-world it's a brand new game where you still need to cover your expenses, while in Windows-world it's an old game that already have paid of and therefore don't need to cover development costs. There's quite a difference between selling the last copies of a game cheap, and selling the first copies of a brand new game. The first can be done at about the cost of the CD/DVD, packaging and shipping while the latter also need to cover stuff like developing, royalty etc.

If you think it's useless I guess you're missing the point here. It's making another game available in Linux, and also creating a marked for games in Linux.

... and I suppose you think porting a game is cheap? I think Svartalf know this and can explain it way better than me, but there's quite a lot of expenses that need to be covered. Comparing the price of the Linux-version to the current price of the Windows-version is quite unfair. In Linux-world it's a brand new game where you still need to cover your expenses, while in Windows-world it's an old game that already have paid of and therefore don't need to cover development costs. There's quite a difference between selling the last copies of a game cheap, and selling the first copies of a brand new game. The first can be done at about the cost of the CD/DVD, packaging and shipping while the latter also need to cover stuff like developing, royalty etc.

If you think it's useless I guess you're missing the point here. It's making another game available in Linux, and also creating a marked for games in Linux.

And congrats on seeing to it that you won't see any major titles on Linux for some time to come.

Each time you buy a Windows SKU, even in the bargain bin like you're proposing, is a vote for making more Windows software. Do you run Windows or Linux? If the answer is Linux, why, pray tell, would you buy software not designed for your OS? Because you can run it under WINE? Heh... You're not their customer and the moment they decide to do something that fixes a problem on their customer's machines and breaks it running under WINE, you're going to be SOL- because they make Windows software instead of WINE software.

Publishers and studios go off of sales figures, not "installed base"- as long as they think there's no money to be had (and you just proved this just now with your post...) with a Linux version and they can make money by making half-assed Windows versions, they're going to do it.

Keep bitching about price, nobody wants to buy, etc. folks- you all that're doing the bitching are the reason we're in the mess we're in.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

I only game in Linux... this is a new game for me. I don't care when it came out for Windows or what the cost is for Windows today. LGP makes games for Linux gamers & have to pay employees to port it, plus license the code to the game they are porting. People should try to remember this more often.